The present invention relates to a decorative hand railing and, more particularly, to a hand railing that can easily be connected to a post or column or wall at various angles and be securely attached thereto.
Hand railings have been around forever. Over the years, they have been made of various materials and have taken various shapes. More recently, with the advent of strong durable vinyl, they have found many uses out doors on porches, walkways, stairs and the like.
As is well known in the art, vinyl is not used alone to form vinyl railings since it is not structurally strong enough. Rather, the core of vinyl railings is normally formed of extruded aluminum which can have various different cross-sectional shapes. The aluminum forms the structure of the railing while the vinyl is the finish or decorative portion thereof.
In practice, a vinyl sleeve fits over the extruded core or lengths of vinyl caps snap over portions of the core to form the railing. The vinyl may come in different colors or finishes. But once attached to the core, they normally cannot be changed. The home owner or property owner must live with whatever color or design he or she has chosen unless they remove the railing and start again. To Applicant's knowledge, no railing system presently exists that allows the owner to change the appearance thereof once it is installed.
Other problems exist with known railing systems that sometimes make them difficult to install. The ends of the hand rails must be secured to posts or columns or other vertical surfaces such as a building wall or the like. This is not normally a difficult problem when the railing and the vertical surface meet at a substantially 90° angle. In such a case, a rectangular block or an L-bracket is secured to the core of the railing and then to the vertical surface.
The problem arises when attempting to secure the railing to a vertical surface that is at an angle to the railing either vertically or horizontally. This occurs, for example, with respect to a hand rail used on a staircase. The railing may be at an angle of 30° or 45° or substantially any angle from the horizontal relative to the top and bottom post or wall or the like to which it must be attached. A similar problem exists when a horizontal railing is to be attached to a vertical surface and must extend away from the surface to the left or right at an angle that is more or less than 90°.
With current railing systems available today, there is no easy way to securely attach the rail a vertical surface at an angle (other than 90°). There is no connector that universally adjusts to or accepts any angle. To Applicant's knowledge, this is currently done using the same L-bracket or block with a longer screw extending through the same to be attached to the vertical surface. This results in a relatively weak attachment. In the prior art known to Applicant, when the railing is attached to a vertical surface at an angle, there is only a single point of contact between the core and the surface.
There have been attempts in the past to address the problem of securing a railing to a vertical surface at an angle but to Applicant's knowledge, none has been successful.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,964,452, for example, shows a block inserted into the end of a railing and is pivotally mounted thereto. While this may allow the railing to be secured to a vertical surface at different horizontal angles, it does not allow for different vertical angles. Furthermore, it is attached to the rail at only one pivot point, thereby making it less secure. It could possibly pivot and move after installation.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,167,275 to Bizzarri also shows a block that can be pivotally attached to a rail and adjusted to different angles. But again, it does not allow for different vertical angles.
There is, therefore, a need for a railing system that can be easily and securely connected to a post or other vertical surface at different vertical or horizontal angles and which allows for the appearance of the same to be changed whenever desired.